So do a lot of other Japanese housewives, who make up the majority of visitors thronging the galleries each morning. The museum, really three floors in a sleek new office and hotel complex, is the result of an unprecedented deal between the Boston MFA and the Nagoya Chamber of Commerce and Industry. In exchange for $50 million, to be paid over 20 years, the MFA will lend Nagoya works from its permanent collection. Art lovers in this industrial city have greeted the new venture with great enthusiasm, flocking to the inaugural exhibitions, “Art of the Ancient Mediterranean World” and especially “Monet, Renoir and the Impressionist Landscape,” which showcases Monet’s 1891 “Grainstack (Sunset).” “It’s a win-win situation,” says Malcolm Rogers, director of the Boston MFA. “It’s a financially rewarding agreement for us and, I believe, an artistically rewarding one for Nagoya.”
Even so, many Japanese are having second thoughts about the arrangement. When the Boston MFA first floated the idea in 1990, it was running a $3 million deficit, while Nagoya, Japan’s fourth largest city, was flush with cash but desperate for culture. Now the partners have undergone a dramatic reversal of fortunes. Thanks largely to Rogers, who spearheaded a $137 million-capital campaign, the MFA is finally in the black. Meanwhile, Nagoya–like all of Japan–is struggling mightily to recover from its economic crash. Indeed, the Bank of Japan reported last month that economic recovery in the Greater Nagoya area is even slower than in the rest of the country. And for the first time in more than 50 years, Aichi prefecture, the region where Nagoya is the seat, reported budget deficits for 1998. Many Japanese museums are already feeling the pinch, as local governments begin to slash their acquisition budgets. Under such circumstances, $50 million for art–even over two decades–feels like an unnecessary burden.
The arrangement was plagued by bad timing from the start. Almost as soon as the two parties signed a letter of intent in 1991, Japan’s stock market collapsed. Interest rates fell and the yen plummeted, threatening to undo the agreement. In December 1993, Ryuichi Kato, the chairman of the Nagoya Chamber of Commerce and Tokai Bank, resigned, allegedly over problems with the Boston deal. “Frankly, they should have scrapped the project when the economy burst,” says Nobuo Abe, a prominent Japanese art critic. “They began planning this when they had money. But even after many companies began having problems, they didn’t have the courage to stop it.”
The two parties finally signed an agreement in 1995, after nearly four years–and several near collapses. A key sticking point of the contract, which stipulates that Boston compile four five-year or “permanent” shows and 40 six-month shows, was who determines which works are sent. “The two areas [the Japanese] have a strong interest in are Japanese art and Impressionism,” says Alan Strassman, former chairman of the board at MFA. “And probably left to their own devices, they would take only that.” The agreement holds that while Nagoya is free to present a wish list, Boston retains the final say-so. Three years before the contract expires in 2019, the parties will meet to decide whether to renew it.
Both sides were no doubt encouraged by the profitable overseas ventures of other American museums. Most successful is the Guggenheim, which operates flourishing satellites in Venice, Berlin and, most recently, Bilbao, Spain. That branch, which opened in 1997, has proved highly lucrative, both for the Guggenheim and for Spain. In addition to spending $100 million to build the museum, the Basque regional government paid the Guggenheim a one-time fee of $20 million and subsidizes the Bilbao’s $12 million annual budget. But the returns on that investment have been substantial; in the 18 months since the Bilbao opened, tourism in the Basque region has increased by 28 percent. An independent study group also found that the museum has created 3,800 new jobs and added more than $160 million to the lo- cal economy.
But until now, no U.S. museum has ever ventured into Asia. It’s easy to see why Boston found Nagoya so appealing; the “sister cities” share a deep historical bond. Shortly after Commodore Matthew Perry opened Japanese ports to the West in 1854, three Boston-area collectors landed there and began acquiring ceramics, woodblock prints, scrolls and statues. Their holdings now form the core of the MFA’s extensive Japanese collection, widely considered the finest outside Japan–and better than many in Japan. Today, one third of all foreign visitors to the Boston MFA come from Japan. Patrons of the new Nagoya museum have been particularly enthralled by the Japanese Corner, which has featured native works like the 17th-century six-panel folding screen “European King and Members of His Court.”
And just as the MFA embraces Japanese culture, so, too, does Nagoya now embrace Boston’s. Residents in the busy Kanayama district have nicknamed the street across from the museum building Boston Street and even installed 1890s-style gas street lamps. Subway passes and telephone cards now bear the images of the MFA’s masterpieces.
Outside the Nagoya branch, the lines have shrunk a bit. With the kids out of school for the summer, housewives have less time to themselves. But many still try to take in the exhibitions whenever they get the chance. “It’s small, but it’s a good size when you have less than an hour before you need to go grocery shopping,” says Asako Honma, a 45-year-old housewife from Nagoya. “I was moved to see those beautiful paintings up close.” Other Japanese art lovers would be wise to see them now, while they still can.
